Free days in Cairns

Saturday and Monday were free days in Cairns. If you read the other blogs, you will see what some students do with their free time. Charlie typically catches up on paperwork and checks in with the vendors in the next city to be visited. I work on my blogs and on the quiz. We take a break for a few hours and do something in the city. The free days in Brisbane were back-to-back, so we spent the first day with a subset of our students at the Australia Zoo. But the second day followed our typical pattern.

In Cairns on Saturday, we walked to the botanical gardens by way of the esplanade. The day was sunny and warm and many people were out walking or biking, and there were even some people venturing out onto sandy patches in the mud flats. There are a few small playgrounds along the esplanade, and these were starting to fill up. Every once in a while we would peer over the boardwalk at the mud flats to see if we could see a mudskipper. There were dozens of little mud crabs, but no skippers, much to Charlie’s disappointment. This was our second attempt to see one.

The walk to the gardens was a little over an hour. We did a self-guided tour around a portion of the gardens, and then sat down to lunch at the café. We both ordered the waffle with fruit salad. We could have ordered just one for the both of us. The waffle took up the entire plate and was piled high with fruit and ice cream. Neither of us finished our waffle.

To work off the calories, we walked along the garden’s boardwalk through some marshy territory and then back to the hotel.

Today, once the quiz was written and edited, we went back to the esplanade. I simply can’t get over how Cairns solved the problem of having a shoreline but no usable beaches. Mangroves once grew here but were torn out in WWII by the Americans so that they could better see the approach of ships. So, instead of beaches, Cairns has mudflats. At low tide, we can see mud crabs sunning themselves or digging down into the mud. Birds poke around in the mud looking for food. But no mudskippers!

Back to the lack of beaches! Cairns has a huge swimming pool, easily a full block, that starts just a few feet away from the mud flats. It is not rectangular in shape; I wish I could see it from above to see if there is a recognizable design. Pieces jut out here and there, and most corners are not right angles. One edge has a sandy “beach”, the other grass and concrete. There are fountains and sprayers, shallow areas for toddlers and areas deep enough for swimming laps. EVERY CITY NEEDS SUCH A POOL! I haven’t looked it up online yet to see if there is a picture to do it justice.

In the morning, we walked around the marina to see the ships. Late afternoon we returned to see the tide come in. Today we really did see it come in! In Maryland, my family would vacation on a tidal creek. Waves were always lapping up on the shore, but you didn’t notice a change in the water level unless you checked back in 15 minutes or so. Here, we actually saw the water roll in and stay. With it came a mudskipper! At last, I have seen one! Initially, it looked like a small branch drifting in, but it started moving with purpose. It came close enough to the boardwalk so that Charlie could identify it.

Tomorrow we fly to Alice Springs.